The Scientific Monthly, October to December, 1915Various
Science
The Scientific Monthly, October to December, 1915
Various
Science -- Periodicals; Technology -- Periodicals
As loss of energy from the earth's interior went on this
central core of gas would enlarge until the middle shell was
hardly self-supporting. Then, probably at some time of
astronomic strain when the earth's, orbit was extra elliptical,
it would collapse, in collapsing generate heat, and so stop the
process. The collapse would be transmitted to the viscous layer
which might be increased, motions set up in it, and so a
wrinkling of the outer thin crust on which we live.
Then there would be four layers to the earth like the butternut
of the figure. First, the inner kernel of gas; second, the hard
shell or endocarp; third, a viscous layer like the sarcocarp or
pulp, and outside of all the wrinkled crust of exocarp. If such
is the structure of the earth we may have in the very structure
of the earth itself a reason why from time to time there are
collapses of the middle layer leading to elevations of portions
of the outer rind, and marking off the chapters in geological
history, the lines between geological systems.
There are reasons in facts of observation for believing that
such is the structure of the earth, of which I have as yet said
nothing. We see the interior of a glass marble, I saw the
bubble in the interior of Bridgman's glass marble, how? By
waves, vibrations, which start from the sun or some other
source, and going through it reach my eye. Though the earth is
not penetrated by sunlight it is penetrated by the waves and
vibrations that start from that jar produced by a crack which
we call an earthquake. These vibrations can be received by that
eye of the geologist called a seismograph. The seismologist
tells us there are three kinds of waves sent out in an
earthquake. If you notice the explosion of a blast at a little
too close distance you will notice that you see it first, then
hear it, and then perhaps a little later a few chips of rock
may come flying past your ears. These three things correspond
somewhat to the three kinds of waves which spread forth from an
earthquake. But in the case of the explosion we see the blast
first, then hear later. The waves which produce the sensation
of sight are, we know, lateral disturbances, the waves which
produce the sensation of sound are waves of condensation, whose
motion is in the direction of their propagation and they come
later. In the case of the jars of earth, the reverse is true.
The first set of waves to arrive are the waves which are due to
compression--vibrations in the direction in which the waves are
produced--and correspond to sound waves. Later come waves which
are transverse sidewise disturbances of the solid mass of the
earth. As we can easily see, in an earthquake jar traveling
from the opposite end of the earth, there should be no
insurmountable difficulty in recognizing the jar, which is a
direct upthrow from one which would tilt it to the right or
left. Now there is a law of Laplace by which the velocity of
spread of sound waves through gas may be calculated. That this
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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